


Departure

by Davechicken



Series: The Emperor and his Knight [30]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-09
Updated: 2017-02-09
Packaged: 2018-09-23 01:07:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 757
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9633260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken
Summary: Ben has to go.





	

Ben is tired of fighting. He’s been fighting for so very, very long. He’s been fighting his classmates, his father, his mother, his uncle, his… self. Anyone and everyone. _Everything_ is a battle. His knees barely have time to heal from one ‘training’ session to the next, and no matter how hard he fights, it doesn’t work.

_Stop fighting_ , his uncle will say. _Violence is the last step. First you must look for the harmony_.

He says _harmony_ like a man who has never put a pillow over his head to drown out shouting voices downstairs. He says _harmony_ like someone who only had to learn how to work moisture vaporators and fly swoop-bikes until he was an adult. He says _harmony_ like someone who hasn’t felt the shadow of greatness drowning out his flickering light from the moment he could tell ‘me’ from ‘you’. He says _harmony_ like someone who doesn’t feel the copper-iron call to rage in his veins, crawling back to coil and serpent itself, deep inside of his heart.

No, Ben cannot do _harmony_. He is made of different stuff, and all the times he’s tried to fit into the boxes they’ve made (son, smuggler, pilot, Jedi) he’s failed.

He isn’t the person they want him to be, and the longer he stays… the more it will hurt. It will hurt him, and it will hurt the people he disappoints. Better to be brave, to admit it’s not working, to make a clean break.

Better by far.

He can’t go on denying such a core part of him. He wonders how his _mother_ ever thought this would be a good idea? His fire burns as brightly as hers, and she never trained to be a _Jedi_ , which he’s beginning to think was as much born of fear as it was of practicality.

He simply can’t go on.

Poe comes when he comms. They meet out in the woods behind the temple, in their usual, secret spot. Ben’s been crying, but he’s wiped his face as raw as he can, set his jaw in as mature a line as he is able to muster.

He’s told Poe. He’s told him everything. Told him about the Voice and the things it says. 

To begin with, Poe begged him to tell his mother, or his uncle. 

Ben had stopped talking about it to him, and Poe had realised - in time - that it wasn’t an option. That it was Poe, or it was nothing.

So he’d promised just to listen, and not tell anyone else.

Poe knows. Poe knows how the Jedi forbid things. How they aren’t even supposed to be _friends_ , not like they are. Poe’s been increasingly less vocal about Ben staying, increasingly quiet.

When he arrives on his swoop-bike, Ben knows that Poe is already aware what’s about to happen. He doesn’t need the Force for that.

“I… have to go. You know, don’t you?” Ben pleads him to understand.  


Poe nods. “Yeah.”

“I can’t… be who they want me to be. It would be the death of me, Poe. I _can’t_ turn off my emotion. I’m too afraid, and I…”  


“You shouldn’t have to,” Poe replies, shortly.  


“He said he could help me. Could make the pain go away. He said he could teach me… I’ve _tried_ their way…”  


Hand through his hair, and Poe nods. “Yeah. Okay. Where do you need to go?”

“You… know they’ll punish you?”  


“What, your new friends?”  


Ben shakes his head. “My family.”

“They’ll have to catch me, first. If you’re going… I’m going with. If this place isn’t good enough for you, it isn’t good enough for me.”  


Ben swallows at a fierce rock lodged in his throat. “You… you’re sure?”

“Ben, if they can’t - if they can’t appreciate who you are, here, then they aren’t half the people I thought they were. Besides… someone gotta look out for my Benny.” He grips his forearm, his dark eyes intent.  


A surge of hope inside, and Ben launches himself at Poe, wrapping his arms around the older boy, breathing him in. He’s too choked to speak aloud. Too much ache in his chest and fruit in his mouth. _Thank you. Thank you._

He’s hugged back, even if Poe arches up to do it. Ben is shooting up fast, and soon he’s going to leave Poe way, way behind, he can tell. Physically, at least. For now, they rock together in the dark of the trees.

He won’t be alone. He’ll have Poe. 

It’s going to be okay.


End file.
